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Election of Chinese Interpol President Raises Alarmhttp://chinadigitaltimes.net/2016/11/election-chinese-interpol-president-raises-alarm/
Wed, 16 Nov 2016 17:25:28 +0000http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?p=197714On November 10, the international law enforcement organization Interpol announced the election of its new president, Meng Hongwei. Given Meng’s position as China’s vice-minister for public security and senior roles in its paramilitary People’s Armed Police and Coast Guard, the appointment has stirred some consternation among rights activists and other observers. From Interpol:

Delegates at INTERPOL’s 85th General Assembly have elected Meng Hongwei of China as the new of President of INTERPOL.

Mr Meng, China’s Vice Minister of Public Security, who will take up his duties with immediate effect, said as a veteran policeman he stood ready to do everything he could towards the cause of policing in the world.

“We currently face some of the most serious global public security challenges since World War Two,” said Mr Meng.

“INTERPOL, guided by the best set of principles and mechanisms to date, has made a significant contribution to promoting international police cooperation.

“INTERPOL should continue to adhere to these principles and strategies, while further innovating our work mechanisms, in order to adapt to the changing security situation we see today,” said Mr Meng. [Source]

Recent years have witnessed closer cooperation and exchanges on law enforcement between China,Interpoland its members,which have produced substantial results. China highly values the important role played by Interpol, and stands ready to take on bigger responsibility and make greater contribution to push for global law enforcement and security cooperation.

We appreciate the active response from other member countries to our decision of running for the Interpolpresident. China will continue to fully support the Interpol’s work, keep deepening the mutually beneficial coordination with other member countries on combating transnational crimes and jointly create a secure environment for the prosperity and development of the world economy. [Source]

“The appointment of Meng Hongwei is alarming given China’s longstanding practice of trying to use Interpol to arrest dissidents and refugees abroad,” Nicholas Bequelin, East Asia director of Amnesty International, said in a statement. “It seems at odds with Interpol’s mandate to work in the spirit of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.”

Beyond handling routine policing matters, China’s Ministry of Public Security protects the Communist Party and its leaders. This raises the possibility that Mr. Meng could use his influence at Interpol to target critics of the Chinese government. Mr. Meng steps into the post as Interpol embarks on an effort to systematically collect and share biometric information of suspected terrorists.

China and Russia are among the countries that have abused Interpol’s “red notice” database of information about fugitives. While the system is central to international law enforcement cooperation — preventing suspected terrorists from obtaining visas, for instance — it has been used to punish journalists, pro-democracy activists and human rights defenders. There is a mechanism for people to challenge red notice alerts, but it can be time-consuming and costly.

As Interpol’s president, Mr. Meng will run its executive committee, which plays a key role in setting the agenda for new initiatives and has oversight over the work of the secretary general, the day-to-day chief. His appointment calls into question the firmness of Interpol’s commitment “not only to refrain from any possible infringements of human rights, but also to actively promote the protection of human rights.” [Source]

More than 1 million officials have been handed punishments ranging from lengthy prison terms to administrative demerits or demotions. While authorities deny their targets are selected for political purposes, several of the highest-profile suspects have been associated with Xi’s predecessor Hu Jintao and other rivals.

China’s police and judicial systems have been routinely criticized for abuses, including confessions under torture, arbitrary travel bans and the disappearance and detention without charges of political dissidents and their family members. That has prompted reluctance among many Western nations to sign extradition treaties with China or return suspects wanted for non-violent crimes.

[…] Given those circumstances, Meng’s election is an “alarming prospect,” said Maya Wang, Hong Kong-based researcher with Human Rights Watch.

“While we think it’s important to fight corruption, the campaign has been politicized and undermines judicial independence,” Wang said. Meng’s election “will probably embolden and encourage abuses in the system,” she said, citing recent reports of close Chinese ally Russia’s use of Interpol to attack President Vladimir Putin’s political opponents. [Source]

Some countries, including Russia, “work really hard to get Interpol alerts” against political enemies, said Jago Russell, the chief executive of Fair Trials International, a human rights group in London, because “this helps give credibility to their own prosecution and undermines the reputation of the accused.”

[…] Based in Lyon, France, and comprising 190 countries, Interpol defines its role as enabling “police around the world to work together to make the world a safer place.” It has often done this, allowing police forces to share information about the whereabouts of mafia bosses, murderers and other criminals, and to secure their arrest.

But the Interpol membership of nations — like Russia, Iran and Zimbabwe — that routinely use their justice systems to persecute political foes has stirred worries that wanted notices can be easily misused. In September, the congressional Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission heard a litany of complaints about abuse from experts and victims of Interpol notices during a discussion of how to reform the police organization’s system of so-called red notices.

[…] Stung by criticism that its role fighting real crime is being hijacked by repressive regimes, Interpol has moved to strengthen safeguards against abuse, particularly since the naming of a new secretary general, Jürgen Stock, in late 2014. Mr. Russell, of Fair Trials International, acknowledged that the group “is trying to make it more difficult to game the system.” [Source]

[…] China is one of many countries that have misused Interpol to pursue dissidents across the globe. It is wrong, however, to suggest that Hongwei’s appointment will allow China to do this more often and more easily. These decisions, with enormous implications for the people they affect, are made by Interpol’s secretariat, headed by Jurgen Stock (the real leader of Interpol’s operations).

Under Stock, Interpol has started the long-overdue task of creating safeguards against the kinds of abuse suffered by Uighur activists pursued by China. Last week, Stock announced further much-needed reforms to maintain “the confidence and trust of national law enforcement and wider society in Interpol”. The detail of these reforms haven’t yet been published so it’s hard to predict whether they will be effective in weeding out abusive cases. Ultimately, Interpol should be judged by whether it continues to allow its systems to be used as a tool of persecution. […] [Source]

Would the new China Coast Guard be an administrative organization filling out its ranks with civil servants, a possibility suggested by its situation within SOA? Or would it instead build a service of soldiers empowered to investigate, detain, and arrest, an equally plausible outcome given the appointment of Meng Hongwei, a senior officer within the Ministry of Public Security? The answer to this question has more than arcane importance. China deploys its maritime law enforcement forces as instruments of sea power, indeed, like a second navy. By patrolling and administering claimed jurisdictional waters, they defend and advance China’s position in its territorial and maritime boundary disputes. To date, the “rights protection” (weiquan) duties have almost entirely been performed by the civil servants, not the soldiers or policemen. Changes to this arrangement could have very real implications for other disputants. [Source]

The island’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs also said having no access to the information of Interpol – or International Criminal Police Organisation – was posing a challenge to Taiwan’s crime-fighting operations, especially since cross-border crime is becoming a serious problem amid the trend of globalisation.

[…] Taiwan was forced to withdraw from Interpol in 1984 when mainland China joined the organisation.

For the first time in 32 years, Taipei applied to Interpol in October to participate as an observer at its 85th annual general assembly, which runs from Monday until Friday in Bali, Indonesia.

In response, both Interpol President Mireille Ballestrazzi and Secretary-General Jürgen Stock have written separately to Commissioner Liu Po-liang, of Taiwan’s Criminal Investigation Bureau, stating its decision to turn down Taipei’s application, the ministry said. [Source]

China has become not only the workshop of the world, but also the epicentre of labour unrest. Increasingly, aggrieved workers are taking legal and extra-legal actions to defend their interests in the absence of leadership by trade unions. Based on our field research of Taiwanese-owned Foxconn Technology Group and other scholarly studies in China, we highlight the fact that at key nodes of production, the integration of large manufacturers in transnational supply chains and tight delivery schedules for electronic and other consumer products have enhanced workers’ bargaining power at the workplace level. With workers’ growing awareness of the opportunities presented by the fact that giant corporations face pressures to meet quotas for new models and holiday season purchases, they have repeatedly come together at the dormitory, workshop, or factory level to voice demands or to stage protests. Access to internet and social networking technology also enables workers to disseminate open letters and to tweet urgent appeals for support.

Thus far, collective labor actions are mostly short-lived and confined to a single workplace or an industrial sector. If some of these struggles have resulted in limited wage gains, the harsh reality remains that worker victories have not translated into long-term gains in the form of unions responsive to labour or the emergence of a movement with a comprehensive labour agenda. Following the recent state-led repression of worker leaders and their supporters in Guangdong, where internal migrants have been forging active cross-border links with non-governmental organizations, the prospects of mainland Chinese labour activism remain problematic. [Source]

Selden and Chan also discuss the often frustrated aspirations of younger migrants for urban lifestyles, higher skills, more security, and greater prosperity.

[… I]n the glaring and global publicity of widespread labour law violations and growing militancy, Guangdong’s political leaders adopted a more relaxed attitude to LNGOs than anywhere else in China. Although LNGO funding remained – and remains – a profoundly sensitive issue, the capacity of LNGOs to provide legal assistance to workers dovetailed with the state’s declared goal of channeling labour grievances into juridical channels of dispute resolution – dispute arbitration committees and the courts. The Guangdong Federation of Trade Unions even formed cautious partnerships with some more service-minded LNGOs.

In short, LNGOs in Guangdong were able to take advantage of what Jude Howell and I have formulated as ‘pragmatic authoritarianism’: a variation of authoritarianism that astutely combines sufficient levels of coercion to maintain social order with sufficient flexibility to concede demands to preserve economic growth. The big question now is whether or not the recent trial and clampdown spells the end of an era of pragmatism.

[…] 杀鸡儆猴 (sha ji jing hou) is a well-known Chinese idiom that conveys warning: to ensure that the monkeys witness the killing of the chickens. It is certainly possible to interpret the recent clampdown on a specific LNGO in Guangdong as a warning to others that they have gone too far in their strike interventions [….] If this is the case, the problem for the authorities is that the monkeys – LNGOs and workers – are not likely to remain cowed for very long. The antagonistic interests between labour and capital that LNGOs were relieving to a certain extent via the promotion of collective bargaining will not go away. As I argue elsewhere, taking out skilled labour organizers and negotiators such as the still detained activist Meng Han whom I referred to at the start of this article means that strikes are more likely to be repressed rather than resolved. The historical evidence suggests this will generate more intense and widespread resistance further down the capitalist road. [Source]

The sentences were bittersweet. They were lighter than expected, especially that of Zeng Feiyang who was the target of a high-level smear campaign conducted by state media organs soon after his arrest and not allowed to see his lawyer for six months. And the suspended sentences mean that they can now go home to be with their families. But the lighter sentences came with a cost. The plaintiffs had to admit they were guilty of “gathering a crowd to disturb social order” even though their efforts to organize workers to engage in collective bargaining had the opposite intention, which was to get workers to the bargaining table and find a peaceful, orderly way to resolve their dispute. And as already mentioned, their sentences mean they may have to abstain from the work that they excelled in, which was to organize and train workers on collective bargaining.

The politics of this case are interesting and there should be more analysis forthcoming. The impetus for the arrest of these activists appears to have come from the center, but local law enforcement were charged with carrying out the arrest, investigation and prosecution of this case. In the past, Guangzhou and Panyu law enforcement had cooperated with Feiyang on a number of occasions and knew him well. Did local law enforcement officials play a role in getting a lighter sentence for these plaintiffs and making the best of a difficult situation? Interestingly, while the media reports of the trial focused on Feiyang’s closing statement in the trial concerning foreign funding and involvement, the court verdict made no mention of foreign funding and involvement. Instead, it offered a more narrow argument and set of evidence detailing how the plaintiffs were making efforts to encourage workers in the Lide factory to go on strike. In other words, it looked at the case from the perspective of social stability rather than national security in an effort to lower the sensitivity of the case and justify a lesser sentence for the plaintiffs. [Source]

WSJ: Your research found that Chinese workers are often unsuccessful in using litigation to resolve labor disputes, and many workers still resort to strikes and protests. What implications could this have for industrial relations as China’s economy continues to slow?

Mr. Halegua: China’s courts are ill equipped to deal with the rise in bankruptcies, plant closures, mass layoffs, or the restructuring of state-owned enterprises. Political solutions to these disputes are often necessary.

The government prioritizes maintaining order and stability, using whatever mix of cash, coercion and other measures is necessary to quell worker unrest. Authorities are quick to intervene in strikes or protests and attempt to mediate a settlement. Where a private employer lacks the money, the government often uses its own funds to pay the workers and resolve the dispute.

Thus far, China has been able to manage labor unrest through this ad hoc strategy. However, this approach is costly for the government and becomes harder to sustain as the number of strikes rises and the government’s own tax revenue falls. [Source]

While the popular perception of labor activism in China may focus on the manufacturing sector, CLB reports that collective action in that sphere actually fell in the third quarter of 2016 compared with the same period last year. It more than doubled in services and retail, however, with Walmart workers, luxury retail staff, and golf caddies among the unrestful. That sector has now overtaken manufacturing in terms of the number of collective actions, and is now second only to construction, which also saw record numbers last quarter.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s national security adviser met a high-ranking Chinese official in Beijing last Monday to hold talks on the issue, which a former Canadian dipomat suggests was a quid pro quo between the two countries for Mr. Garratt’s release.

[…] Former diplomat Charles Burton said it appears China used Mr. Garratt as a bargaining chip to get what it wanted, including a role in helping Canada Border Service Agency agents identify illegal Chinese immigrants.

[…] “We don’t have an extradition treaty with China for fairly clear reasons. The rules of evidence are not the same there. There are reports of death sentences for white-collar crime and pervasive evidence of torture and interrogation,” Mr. Burton said.

Canada usually forbids the extradition of people to countries with the death penalty, although Chinese fugitives have been repatriated on condition they are not executed and that Canadian diplomats are permitted to visit them in prison.

[…] Canada has returned more than 1,400 Chinese nationals since 2009, mainly involving illegal immigration. [Source]

The secret Chinese visits have raised concern among lawyers and prompted investigations by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and the RCMP, even as the Trudeau government begins negotiations for an extradition treaty with China.

According to an insider briefed on China’s secret-agent operation, the Chinese moved to tactics that include threats and intimidation because they were “ticked off” at Canada for “not being willing to send people back the instant they asked” and for dragging its feet on an extradition treaty.

[…] U.S. diplomats warned China in 2015 to stop using its security agents on American soil to pressure Chinese citizens to return home to face its court system.

While Mr. Trudeau was in China for an official visit earlier this month, The Globe asked him about the tactics Chinese agents are alleged to have used. In response, Mr. Trudeau said such issues are “exactly why” the two sides established a high-level dialogue on security and rule of law with China, “which will allow Canadian officials and Chinese officials to discuss specific cases, to discuss the principles and concerns that both sides have.” [Source]

Even with a treaty in place, Canadian courts must still be persuaded that there is sufficient evidence to justify extradition, the Minister of Justice must personally approve the decision, and the person in question has the right to appeal. “In all cases,” according to Canada’s Ministry of Justice, “the conduct for which extradition is sought must be considered criminal in both the requesting country and in Canada.” This requirement would sit somewhat at odds with the normal course of corruption investigations of Chinese officials, in which suspects are first investigated for breaches of Party rules, not criminal law, and only subsequently turned over to judicial organs for prosecution.

The United States, Britain and New Zealand have refused to negotiate such treaties, and Australia has not ratified one that it signed with China in 2007, largely over concerns including the systemic use of torture to extract confessions, show trials and the imposition of the death penalty for noncapital crimes.

[…] “The extraordinary weaknesses in China’s due process and fair trial rights are well documented,” said Sophie Richardson, China director for Human Rights Watch. “China wants this treaty to create a veneer of legality for fundamentally abusive tactics. Beijing will then also be able to say to other governments, ‘Canada signed one, why won’t you.’”

[…] In an emailed statement, Canada’s Foreign Affairs Ministry said the promotion and protection of human rights were a priority in Canada’s relationship with China, and that the recent discussions included extradition and transfers of offenders, “where we have stressed that Canada is governed by very high standards,” it said.

Yet critics of the agreement say it is another sign of Mr. Trudeau’s capitulation to China that ultimately does little to protect Canadian interests or values, while strengthening Beijing’s hand. [Source]

Today, China’s legal system has taken on some characteristics of Western law, but its legal culture is another story. Judicial independence is not a fact. And defence lawyers themselves are apt to be in more danger of punishment from the Chinese state than their clients. Due process? Fair trial? These are hardly guaranteed in China.

Mr. Trudeau is undoubtedly sincere when he says that Canada would insist that no one extradited to China would suffer the death penalty, and Canada can insist on such a condition. But that leaves the door open to a long list of other abuses. For the authoritarian Beijing regime, the benefit of an extradition treaty with Canada would be vastly out of proportion to any quid pro quo that Canada could receive in return. Our courts and government could find themselves regularly asked to ship offenders across the Pacific to the care of a legal system that does not meet our standards. [Source]

With the cooperation of French police and the Chinese embassy in Paris, the “Fox Hunt” campaign team has escorted the suspect surnamed Chen from France. Chen is wanted for economic crimes by police in east China’s Zhejiang Province.

[…] He fled to France in March 2013, and in September 2014, the municipal people’s procuratorate of Rui’an approved his arrest on charges of illegal acquisition of public deposits. In November 2014, Interpol issued a red notice on Chen.

[…] Chinese police have found 409 fugitives hiding overseas as part of the “Fox Hunt 2016” campaign, including 15 listed in an Interpol red notice.

The campaign has seen the arrest of 272 fugitives and 137 others have been persuaded to return from 61 countries and regions. [Source]

[…] With the cooperation of the French side, the “Fox Hunt” campaign team under the Ministry of Public Security has escorted the suspect Chen Wenhua from France, who is wanted by police in China’s Zhejiang Province.

This is the first fugitive repatriated from France since the China-France extradition treaty took effect in 2015, marking a major breakthrough for hunting suspects who have fled to France. This is also another example of China’s successful extradition of fugitives from European countries after Italy and Spain.

I would like to emphasize that the Chinese government attaches great importance to international cooperation on tracking down fugitives and pursuing illicit gains. We have had effective and reciprocal cooperation on individual cases with relevant countries based on treaties or through diplomatic channels in recent years. Looking forward, we will intensify our efforts to hunt fugitives and pursue ill-gotten assets overseas, and keep building and improving the legal network to put all the fugitives and their illicit assets under the sky net of anti-corruption. [Source]

]]>196872Prosperity, Stability, Control: Beijing’s Clashing Prioritieshttp://chinadigitaltimes.net/2016/08/prosperity-stability-control-beijings-conflicting-priorities/
Mon, 29 Aug 2016 18:53:21 +0000http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?p=196290Economic growth and poverty reduction are two of the Chinese Communist Party’s core goals and sources of legitimacy. Last week, a Wall Street Journal columnist and a U.N. special rapporteur argued that there is increasing tension between them and Beijing’s other priorities of political control and social stability.

The crackdown is telling us that the leadership, despite outward displays of confidence, is growing increasingly insecure as it grapples with faltering growth, the mainstay of the Communist Party’s legitimacy. That translates into crippling indecision; leaders seem unable to summon the resolve to implement tough yet necessary economic overhauls.

[…] In purely economic terms, closing down these industrial relics [state-owned enterprises] is a no-brainer. They add to rampant overcapacity, as well as choking pollution. They’re the zombies at the heart of the country’s growth dilemma: More and more credit is producing less and less output. Mounting corporate debt threatens to crash the financial system. “Warning signs are flashing,” writes David Lipton, the first deputy managing director at the International Monetary Fund.

Yet apparently that prospect isn’t as troubling to the regime as the specter of unemployed workers flooding the streets.

[…] By contrast, the political crackdown is imbued with urgency. A repression index would prominently feature data on the plight of rights lawyers. More than 300 legal professionals and activists were briefly detained or interrogated last year, and several dozen formally held. Show trials are now under way. [Source]

The root of the crackdown, Browne suggests, is the rights lawyers’ “ability to coordinate and channel scattered public grievances at a time of growing economic distress.” Philip Alston, a U.N. Special Rapporteur on human rights and poverty alleviation, warned that the narrowing of channels for such grievances could prove dangerously destabilizing if the public finds itself with no way to raise and resolve problems within the system. Alston described the crackdown on lawyers and activists as past of a “pincer movement” which is “dramatically shrinking space for civil society actions.” From Javier C. Hernández at The New York Times:

The adviser, Philip G. Alston, said that the party’s dominance of the legal system had left Chinese citizens with few avenues to complain about issues like pollution and inequality. He dismissed the process for filing grievances as “window dressing,” and said party officials had suppressed meaningful policy debates.

“The government is coming at this from many different directions,” Mr. Alston, a special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights for the United Nations, said in an interview at the organization’s offices in Beijing. “That is a recipe for serious problems.”

[…] China lacks many of the checks needed to ensure justice for its citizens, Mr. Alston said. The authorities announced this week that they had punished more than 2,000 officials for failing to enforce environmental laws. But Mr. Alston, a New York University law professor, said the government should not be the only watchdog.

“There must be ways for those whose rights are violated to initiate action,” he said.

Mr. Alston said Mr. Xi’s government too often promoted party ideology over accountability. He called a series of high-profile trials of human rights activists this month a “major mistake,” and he expressed concern about the government’s efforts to limit the activities of foreign nongovernmental organizations. [Source]

He noted that the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party is confronted with enormous challenges in the form of slower growth rates, dramatic inequality, deep-rooted environmental degradation, and a struggle to define the rule of law. But he added that its determination to build a ‘moderately prosperous society’ free of extreme poverty cannot be doubted. “This political will is impressive and all too uncommon in today’s world,” Mr. Alston said at the end of his official visit* to the country.

President Xi Jinping has promised to eliminate extreme poverty by 2020, so that no-one shall be left behind. In practice, this means lifting 55.75 million rural people out of extreme poverty defined by reference to an income-based standard of $2.30 per day or 2,800 yuan per year. However, an important part of the human rights dimension of the challenge has so far been neglected according to Alston.

[…] “The crackdown on human rights lawyers that began in July 2015 and gathered pace with recent convictions, the persistent ineffectiveness of the system for petitioning officials, punitive responses to protests, new laws designed to limit the roles played by NGOs and to limit dramatically the role of foreign foundations, all seem to be heading in the direction of shrinking the space available to citizens to influence policy-making through public debate or to contest alleged violations of their rights,” the expert said.

“China has much to be proud of in the field of poverty alleviation. However, if it is to effectively ensure the implementation of its economic and social rights obligations, it needs to adopt more robust mechanisms for citizen involvement and for governmental accountability,” he noted. [Source]

In later remarks to reporters, he chided Beijing for asserting that governments should be able to choose which human rights to respect and which to ignore, depending on cultural practices.

“That approach is simply incompatible with the international human rights system,” Alston said.

“Given that China insists that it is part of the system… it would be very dangerous if we were to understand human rights with Chinese characteristics as authorising a fundamental departure from the full range of internationally agreed rights and standards.” [Source]

Philip Alston, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, told reporters at the end of a nine-day visit to China that he had notified the government in advance of academics he wanted to meet on his visit, a routine practice for a U.N. special rapporteur.

“None of those meetings were arranged, and the message I got from many of the people I contacted was that they had been advised that they should be on vacation at this time,” said Alston, an Australian who is a law professor at the New York University School of Law.

[…] Alston said he was taken on an “abysmal tour” of a model ethnic village near the southwestern city of Kunming, where officials presented minorities in terms of colorful dances but not in terms of education or meaningful protection of language and traditions. [Source]

[…] There is no such thing as the Special Rapporteur being interfered by the Chinese government when engaging with some scholars, and the claim about an activist being harassed when planning to meet with the Special Rapporteur is even more preposterous.

I would like to make two points on what the Special Rapporteur said after this visit.

First of all, after paying visits to China, both the Special Rapporteur and most other people who take a great interest in China’s human rights endeavor come to an objective conclusion, that is, China has made huge headway in the past several decades on economic and social development as well as the human rights condition under the leadership of the Chinese government.

Second, some of them may still be reluctant to admit that China’s achievement is basically attributable to its path of socialism with Chinese characteristics. Some of them may have a stereotype about human rights, and find China odd as it does not go their way. If they do care about human rights and the social and economic development of developing countries, it is hoped that they will take an unbiased view and do some serious thinking. The fact is that the model they have been promoting has not brought progress and genuine human rights to the majority of people in many developing countries. [Source]

Increased attention to wrongful convictions in recent years has caused Chinese judicial authorities to retry more criminal cases and exonerate greater numbers of long-serving prisoners. What these trends mask, however, are the formidable obstacles of getting a criminal case reopened in China.

Whether one looks at the case of Chen Man—released earlier this year after serving 21 years for a murder he didn’t commit—or the posthumous exoneration of Huugjilt in 2014—18 years after his execution—it is clear that it takes many years of petitioning just to get authorities to consider reopening a case. [See details on both cases via CDT.] After a petition is accepted, it can still take years to decide whether it meets the criteria for retrial, as demonstrated by the ongoing effort to secure posthumous exoneration for Nie Shubin.

Critics point out that the protracted and arbitrary manner in which these post-conviction appeals are handled is almost as damaging to the credibility of the judicial system as wrongful convictions themselves. Late last month, a group of lawyers and legal experts met in Beijing to discuss ways to address this problem, indicating that reform may be on the horizon.

[…] First is the simple fact that getting a case reopened relies to a considerable degree on getting judicial authorities to acknowledge the possibility that they made a mistake. Human nature makes this difficult enough, but recent personal accountability measures imposing “lifetime responsibility” for errors in the judicial process may make police and judicial authorities more resistant. This is why lawyer Mao Lixin, who has handled a number of wrongful conviction cases, thinks that such measures need to be calibrated to incentivize individuals and institutions to admit and remedy past mistakes. [Source]

Suggestions include the addition of clearer formal procedures to the Criminal Procedure Law, and the establishment of an independent review body, so that petitions are not handled by the same organs as the original case. Even so, Duihua warns, “individuals convicted of endangering state security and other political crimes will likely continue to find it nearly impossible to have their cases retried,” while others may be deterred by fear of reprisals.

Other proposals which attracted media coverage during this year’s Two Sessions legislative and advisory gatherings aim to prevent wrongful convictions in the first place. Some involve undermining the presumption of guilt that often exists in current practice and can encourage the forced extraction of false confessions. Others, like the independent review body mentioned above, involve better separation of roles in the justice system like those of police, prosecutors, and judges, who now reportedly act as “one family,” and of jailers and investigators, whose current overlap provides conditions conducive to prisoner abuse. Read more on these proposals and official resistance via CDT.

Chen’s is one of a growing number of overturned cases. China’s courts have long convicted nearly all suspects, but as the country’s security and legal apparatuses mature, many of those convictions have turned out to be based on trumped-up charges and forced confessions. In this year’s address to the National People’s Congress, China’s top legislative body, Supreme People’s Court President Zhou Qiang said that in 2015, China’s courts had reviewed about 1,300 cases of suspected miscarriages of justice.

In the weeks following his release, Chen became a nationally recognized character, as media scrambled to report every detail of his story. He had set the unenviable record of having served the most time — nearly 23 years — for a crime he didn’t commit.

In the murder case of Zhong Zuokan, one victim, Chen, has finally found closure. But for Zhong’s family, old scars have been ripped open.

The passing of two decades hasn’t diluted the pain for Li. “The dead body in the morgue appears in my mind every night,” she says. “I will never, ever forget that image.” Li is now 70 years old. Her hair has turned gray, and her face is covered in wrinkles. As she speaks, it’s as if the events she is talking about happened only yesterday. [Source]

The NGO Committee of the United Nations voted today to deny the Committee to Protect Journalists consultative status with the Economic Social Council (ECOSOC). Without such status, CPJ is unable to access U.N. bodies and processes, notably the Human Rights Council in Geneva, where accredited NGOs can deliver a counter-narrative to states. […]

“It is sad that the U.N., which has taken up the issue of press freedom through Security Council and General Assembly resolutions and through the adoption of the U.N. Action Plan, has denied accreditation to CPJ, which has deep and useful knowledge that could inform decision making,” said CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon, who answered the committee’s questions on Tuesday. “A small group of countries with poor press freedom records are using bureaucratic delaying tactics to sabotage and undermine any efforts that call their own abusive policies into high relief.”

CPJ’s ECOSOC accreditation process has been one of Kafka-esqe bureaucratic limbo–an experience shared by other groups. For years, CPJ’s application has been deferred by persistent, lengthy, and repetitive questioning.

During the session, the NGO Committee hid behind the pretense of rules and procedures. For example, there were long and sometimes heated debates as to whether civil society representatives should be allowed to speak at designated points throughout the process. […] [Source]

Normally the committee decides by consensus. But a senior U.S. diplomat requested a vote after South Africa and other committee members kept posing questions that the United States and others denounced as a delaying tactic.

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power said Washington would seek to overturn the NGO committee’s “outrageous” decision by calling for a vote in the 54-nation U.N. Economic and Social Council.

“We are extremely disappointed by today’s vote,” she told reporters. “It is increasingly extremely clear that the NGO committee acts more and more like an anti-NGO committee.”

Western diplomats said the U.N. NGO committee has become increasingly unfriendly to organizations supporting Western notions of human rights, noting that gay rights NGOs and other groups have had trouble securing accreditation. [Source]

The enactment of the Foreign NGO Law signals how China may be getting closer to playing a more relevant role in the shaping of global norms on civil society. The element that in a not so distant future may allow China to play such a role is not determined by the limitations introduced by the Foreign NGO Law, but by mechanisms of an entirely different order.

[…] Until a very recent past, non-governmental, no-profit organizations established by foreigners inside or outside of China enjoyed no legal personality. In a sense, they existed and operated outside of the law. The choice to relegate all those organizations to a legal limbo, where they could be suppressed at will, testified to a reluctance to engage foreign partners on an equal footing. The decision to bestow legal personality on Foreign NGOs, despite the limitations that have been set on their work, testifies to the will to broaden and deepen the engagement of foreign NGOs.

Engagement, whether it be engagement of foreign companies in the late 1970s or of foreign NGOs in 2016, is a double-edged sword, which poses unpredictible challenges, as well as offers novel opportunities. Thus far, despite the international criticism it has attracted, the drafters of the Foreign NGO Law have identified those opportunities which may allow China not just to play a generically more significant role in global affairs, but also to shape emerging global norms on civil society. [Source]

Like China Labour Bulletin’s Shawn Shieh, who has suggested that there is still room for INGOs to shape implementation for the better, Sapio is more optimistic about the new law than many. She argues, for example, that “NGOs benefit from a substantial autonomy in the values they embody and promote through their programs. These values need not be the same as those promoted by the state. As long as it is not seen to pose a political or security threat to the prevailing value system, a certain pluralism in values is becoming a reality.” Writing at China Real Time on the law’s implications for legal work and judicial reform, though, UC Berkeley’s Stanley Lubman offers a bleaker view:

The thrust of the new law is very clear: It is consistent with a vigorous neo-Maoist campaign launched by President Xi Jinping against foreign ideologies and other influences on Chinese social and political development, and is intended to strengthen control by the Chinese Communist Party over Chinese society.

How much more difficult will operation of INGOs be under the new law? Mark Sidel, a professor of law at the University of Wisconsin, writes that the new law signals “a closing to the world.”

[…] Judicial reform is a special and limited sphere, but as long as neo-Maoist authoritarianism inhibits reflection and discussion on China’s governance, especially when Western ideas and institutions are positively mentioned, other law-related reforms may be slowed. The major obstacle is that Mao’s legacy and the party’s role in Chinese history cannot be objectively reexamined under the present rule of Xi Jinping. China’s leader today continues to reinforce Mao’s basic distinction between friends and enemies, with no one in between. [Source]

]]>194240Q&A: Steven Balla on NGO Law & Public Consultationhttp://chinadigitaltimes.net/2016/05/qa-prof-steven-balla-chinas-ngo-law-public-consultation/
Wed, 04 May 2016 23:14:54 +0000http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?p=193647Last week, China’s National People’s Congress passed its long-awaited Foreign NGO Management Law. The bill, which takes effect next year, has a heavy emphasis on national security. It mandates foreign NGOs’ supervision by the Ministry of Public Security and partnership with Chinese organizations, while imposing new controls on funding and recruitment. Chinese officials argue that the law protects the rights of legitimate NGOs while guarding against a malicious minority. But critics including Chinese and foreign NGOs, Western governments, and U.N. human rights experts fear that it will serve as a new instrument of political repression, chilling or freezing the work of both foreign and domestic organizations even in ostensibly apolitical fields. The law’s vagueness is a key concern, potentially leaving room for arbitrary interpretation by the authorities, though civil society expert Shawn Shieh has argued that it could also give NGOs the opportunity to influence implementation in their favor.

When comparing previous drafts of the law, which went through three readings, it is clear that great effort has been made to develop a balanced and comprehensive law.

Gathering opinions from different parties including foreign NGOs that already operate in China, the top legislature made notable changes through every reading.

For instance, the adopted law removed a provision in the original draft that limited foreign NGO offices on the Chinese mainland to one, and deleted the five-year operational limit on representative offices. Restrictions on staff and volunteers were also lifted.

The draft had required a permit for NGOs that wanted to operate temporarily on the mainland. In the adopted law this has been changed to a compulsory report with the regulator 15 days before the program begins. [Source]

Professor Steven J. Balla at George Washington University studies the structure and process of policy making in China and the United States, focusing on public consultation processes and their results. He discussed the consultation on the new law and the process more generally, its motives, and its effectiveness, with CDT via email.

CDT: What are your impressions of the effectiveness of the consultation on the Foreign NGO Management law?

Steven Balla: In some respects, the government consultation and citizen feedback that occurred during the development of the foreign NGO management law is rather atypical. From the perspective of consultation, the NGO law addresses issues that are inherently politically sensitive, namely, civil society and state security. The vast majority of consultations, by contrast, occur in areas of policymaking that are far less controversial and threatening from the perspective of the Chinese Communist Party. Furthermore, and not unrelatedly, much of the feedback that was submitted in response to the draft NGO law emanated from organizations with nationally and internationally prominent profiles. It is more common for participants to be drawn from narrower, less well-known circles of stakeholders.

Despite these important differences, in many respects the development of the foreign NGO management law resembled the government consultation and citizen feedback that is increasingly occurring across policy areas and levels of government in China today.

CDT: When did government consultation and citizen feedback begin? How does the process work?

SB: Government consultation with the public has occurred throughout the history of the People’s Republic of China, although the frequency has been rather low. According to Chinese language sources, from 1949 to 2007, the National People’s Congress circulated a total of fifteen draft laws for citizen feedback.

I want to be clear what I am talking about when referencing “government consultation” and “citizen feedback.” This is a system in which government officials make draft laws and regulations available to the public. These drafts are then open for public comment for periods that typically last for one month, although specific comment periods can be shorter or longer in duration. This sequence of government circulation of policy proposals and solicitation of citizen input is roughly analogous to what is known in the United States as the “notice and comment” process.

CDT: What is the scope and nature of the contemporary system of government consultation and citizen feedback?

SB: With the rapid spread of information and communication technologies, it is not surprising that government consultation and citizen feedback now take place over the Internet. In 2008, the State Council announced that it “will make use of the Internet as a standard method of inviting public opinion on draft laws and regulations.” The website of the State Council’s Legislative Affairs Office operates as a sort of clearinghouse for information about draft laws and regulations that are open for public feedback.

Online consultation occurs not only at the central government, but at the provincial and local levels as well. In fact, the online consultation practices of provincial and local governments are in some ways more developed than those of the central government. Provincial governments, for example, are more likely than central government ministries to disclose information about the feedback that is submitted in response to draft laws and regulations. This kind of disclosure is crucial if the full potential of the Internet as an instrument of consultative policymaking is to be realized.

The adoption of online consultation also varies across ministries and provincial governments. Although online consultation has spread throughout the country, the practice tends to be more developed in wealthy, urban, coastal provinces. Bread-and-butter issues of commerce and social policy are much more likely to be open for public feedback than drafts touching upon politically sensitive matters. There are exceptions to this general rule, however, exceptions that pre-date the foreign NGO management law. In 2012, the central government publicly circulated the draft of a proposed revision to the nation’s criminal procedure law. This consultation resulted in the submission of tens of thousands of comments, many of which addressed the politically charged issue of undisclosed, residential detention of criminal suspects.

CDT: What are the motivations of government officials in soliciting citizen feedback?

SB: Authoritarian regimes throughout the world continually seek ways to shore up their legitimacy, and the CCP is certainly no exception. In recent years, leaders all the way up to President Xi Jinping have emphasized governance reforms, such as online consultation, as a means of enhancing the party’s durability. Internal CCP politics, such as corruption and divisions within leadership factions, provide the party with incentives to seek and mobilize public opinion. In addition, as China develops economically and socially, the policy challenges confronting the party become more complex and difficult to resolve in the absence of robust information. Given that such information is often in the hands of the nation’s increasingly wealthy and well educated population, the party has an incentive to use online consultation to obtain this information. Finally, China’s accession, in 2001, to the World Trade Organization codified commitments to enhance transparency and public involvement in the policymaking process. Although these commitments were made explicitly in the area of trade regulation, the precedent of consultation and feedback has informed decision making in areas across the policy spectrum.

CDT: What do we know about who participates in online consultation? What do participants have to say?

SB: Feedback on draft laws and regulations tends to be submitted by well educated professionals who live in urban areas. In 2008, when the central government asked for feedback on a health care reform proposal, many of the participants were doctors and other workers in the medical industry. This is not to say that “ordinary citizens” never participate in online consultation. The central government received comments on the health care reform proposal that relayed personal or family anecdotes, many of them angry or sad, about problematic encounters with hospitals and medical providers.

Given that participants in online consultation often occupy relatively well-established places in Chinese society, one might expect a dearth of criticism of government policies. As it turns out, negative feedback, some of it quite strident, is much more common than comments encouraging government officials to continue along existing policymaking trajectories. Such negative feedback does not consist merely of expressions of discontent or opposition. In the health care reform consultation, participants drew upon professional knowledge and scientific studies to justify viewpoints that ran contrary to the government’s proposal.

CDT: Does participation matter? What kind of results has online consultation produced? Are there particular cases in which notable concessions have, or have not, been made?

SB: One concern with online consultation, and governance reform in general, is that such instruments serve merely to provide a veneer of popular legitimacy to decisions that government officials have already made behind closed doors. Comments submitted in response to draft laws and regulations are not, as a general matter, made available to the public. This lack of disclosure, in combination with the occurrence of other not readily accessible forms of communication between government officials and nongovernmental actors, means that it is often not possible to reliably trace the effects of public participation on policymaking outcomes.

One means, albeit indirect, of assessing the impact of citizen feedback is through the perceptions and behaviors of participants. Survey research indicates that participants in the health care reform consultation did not have high expectations regarding government responsiveness to the feedback that was submitted. Other anecdotal evidence suggests, by contrast, that public feedback on draft laws and regulations can have significant effects on government decision making. Many of the comments submitted in response to the proposed criminal procedure law objected to the practice of detaining criminal suspects in undisclosed, residential locations. Although the government retained this practice, the permitted duration of such detentions was shortened considerably in the law that was ultimately adopted.

CDT: What other means of consultative policymaking exist? Do these means collectively constitute a coherent framework for incorporating citizen feedback into government decision making?

SB: In contemporary China, a variety of means exist for citizens to express opinions to government officials. These include village elections, deliberative polling, and public hearings on prices, to name just a few. Each of these means has developed independently, in a manner not indicative of a coherent framework for soliciting and receiving feedback in the policymaking process. On top of this, it has proven difficult to institutionalize consultative policymaking. Research shows, for example, that experiments in deliberative polling are often discontinued when supportive government officials are transferred to other jurisdictions.

Viewed in this larger context, online consultation is part of the ongoing, incremental evolution in communication between government officials and citizens during the making of public policy. Given that online consultation derives from the CCP’s quest for legitimacy and durability, it is inherently limited as a means of governance reform. Despite limitations in scope and purpose, online consultation has demonstrated its promise in enhancing transparency in government decision making and shaping policy outcomes, at least under certain circumstances. More broadly, online consultation has the potential to gradually alter the perceptions of government officials and citizens toward the value of seeking and offering public opinion as a standard element of the policymaking process. With such results and possibilities in mind, I would support the development of best practices for the conduct of online consultation that are then consistently implemented, and ultimately assessed for efficacy, across policy areas and levels of government.

]]>193647Lawyers’ Proposals Raised & Rebutted at Two Sessionshttp://chinadigitaltimes.net/2016/03/lawyers-proposals-raised-rebutted-two-sessions/
Tue, 15 Mar 2016 05:12:23 +0000http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?p=192335When Finance Minister Lou Jiwei criticized China’s Labor Contract Law for protecting workers too thoroughly at this year’s Two Sessions in Beijing, Xinhua reported that “the widely held belief that the Great Hall of the People had little room for spontaneous dissent crumbled.” The official backlash against delegate Jiang Hong’s calls for free speech suggests that this space remains tightly constrained, but Lou’s have not been the only critical comments. Legal professionals have challenged various aspects of criminal justice practice in China, particularly the broadcasting of confessions on state television, and torture and obstruction of legal representation during pre-trial detention.

“Outside of a court, no one has the right to decide whether someone is guilty of a crime,” said Zhang Liyong, chief judge of the High People’s Court in central China’s Henan province. “The police aren’t qualified to say someone is guilty. Prosecutors aren’t qualified to declare someone guilty. News media are even less qualified to determine guilt.”

Mr. Zhang made the comments in response to a question from China Real Time on the sidelines of China’s annual legislative sessions, waving off handlers who insisted he was late for a meeting.

[…] Mr. Zhang, known in legal circles for championing more public involvement in court trials through jury-like groups of “people’s assessors,” was not as directly critical of the confessions on Mr. Zhu. But as the president of a provincial High People’s Court, his words carry weight in legal and political circles.

“All the evidence needs to be presented in court, all the arguments need to be made in court, and the final judgement should be based on the court’s investigation and deliberation,” he said, noting that legal authorities had been tasked by the Communist Party with undertaking reforms that promote trial-centered litigation. “There is no other way to see it.” [Source]

Zhang did, though, express approval of reforms to the process of filing cases.

Mr. Zhu also proposed nine judicial reforms that would include expanding bail, allowing lawyers to be present when suspects are interrogated, and articulating conditions for a judge to declare a suspect innocent. Mr. Zhu is criticizing a system with a conviction rate above 99 percent, and in which political influence and people who have not even listened to arguments in court often determine findings of guilt.

A few days later, just as the CPPCC meeting was beginning, Mr. Zhu criticized the dominant influence of the “presumption of guilt” among Chinese “law enforcers.” This presumption, he said, prompts the use of torture, which accelerates the process from arrest to confession. Mr. Zhu observed: “You can imagine how much pressure the court is under if it wants to pass an innocent verdict.”

He further proposed that a law be enacted to protect the right of accused persons to be presumed innocent until proven guilty. More broadly, he urged “proper checks and balances between the work of the police, procurators and the courts, instead of the current practice of close cooperation, which could lead to abuse.”

This comment highlights one of the most distinctive defects of the Chinese criminal process, expressed vividly by a Chinese judge: “As you may know, the police, the judge and the prosecutor are in one family,” quoted in the most authoritative English-language book on Chinese criminal law, “Criminal Justice in China: An Empirical Inquiry,” by Mike McConville et al (p.404, Edward Elgar, 2011). [Source]

The problem, Zhu told Caixin, is that the public security organs are responsible for both investigating and holding suspects. His proposed solution is “separation of investigation and detention,” by reassigning responsibility for pre-trial detention to the Ministry of Justice. This, he argues, could address three difficult problems. It could help basic prevention of forced confessions and excessive detention, safeguarding detainees’ personal rights. It could also protect their rights to meet with lawyers, which Zhu said are often obstructed in order to avoid complicating investigations. “Even if you can meet,” he explained “it’s hard to ensure that you’re not monitored. But if detention centers were neutral ground, separated from Public Security, they would no longer be in direct opposition to legal defense, and lawyers’ difficulty in meeting with clients would naturally be resolved.” Finally, it would help accelerate the progress of rule of law in China, which Premier Li Keqiang announced last week should be “basically in place” by 2020.

Caixin described Zhu’s views as representative of the consensus among legal scholars, noting that Hou Xinyi, a Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference member and associate dean of the Nankai University law school, has been advocating such reforms since 2008. But the Ministry of Public Security, he said, has always claimed that detention centers are already improving, and laughed off the proposal.

“We tried our best to make sure every case processed through the judicial system was fair and justice was served,” Chief Justice Zhou Qiang said when delivering the SPC work report to the National People’s Congress (NPC).

[…] Prosecutors have strived for “constructive interaction with lawyers,” said Procurator-General Cao Jianming, when delivering the SPP work report at the NPC session.

[…] In about 1,000 cases, prosecutors stopped authorities from hindering the work of lawyers.

[…] Courts have upheld the principle of innocence till proven guilty and worked to protect the legal rights of defendants, Zhou said, adding that a total of 1,039 suspects were found not guilty in 2015.

A number of high-profile wrongful convictions were corrected last year while the courts reviewed about 1,300 cases. One such case involved Chen Man, 53, who had spent 23 years in prison for murder and arson. Last month a court overturned his conviction after a 16-year appeal process. [Read more at CDT.]

[…] The number of suspects, placed in custody for more than three years without being charged, reduced from 4,459 in 2013 to six by 2015. [Source]

Authorities describe the introduction of mandatory recording of interrogations as a central reform towards torture reduction. Seton Hall Law School’s Margaret Lewis recently wrote at the University of Nottingham’s China Policy Institute Blog, though, that it “is not significantly changing the culture of extreme reliance on confessions as the primary form of evidence in criminal cases. […] The value of recordings is further limited if the court does not view the interrogation process with a skeptical eye, if the defense has a difficult time accessing the recordings, or if there simply is no defense lawyer, which is true for most criminal cases.” Human Rights Watch claimed that although the measures appeared to have been helpful, police are often able to circumvent them. Zhu Lieyu’s policy of separating detention and investigation could substantially reduce the opportunities to do so.

“In this climate of thought control and so on imposed by Xi Jinping, it takes a lot of courage to make that kind of criticism,” said Willy Lam, an authority on Chinese elite politics.

[…] Mr. Zhu’s public declaration may also put him at some risk, although his political standing is likely to give him some protection, as will the fact that he has not directly challenged Mr. Xi or the party.

“As a CCPCC delegate, Mr. Zhu’s opinions are more or less protected, at least in the month of March,” said Joshua Rosenzweig, an independent human rights researcher in Hong Kong. He expressed doubt that the proposal, one of many the body will consider, would accomplish much.

“But it is significant that the press is covering this. There’s no doubt a certain degree of unhappiness over the televised confessions and the recent push to stress the media’s position as part of the ‘party family.’ This is a way to push back a bit,” he said. [Source]

In China, politics continues to control law. The current leadership has rejected many of the universal legal values that China accepted — at least in principle — under communist rule in some earlier eras. Today, for example, to talk freely about constitutional reform, even within the sheltered confines of universities and academic journals, is not a safe enterprise. And discussion of judicial independence from the Communist Party at the central level is a forbidden subject.

Yet there is discreet, if passive, resistance. Legal professionals are not happy, but they dare not speak for fear of losing their jobs. Some are simply giving up. In Beijing, reportedly, many judges have recently resigned in order to find other work, as lawyers, in business, or in academia. This dissatisfaction could become a crisis for the Chinese legal system.

[…] The very success of over three decades of legal education and practice has created a new legal elite. Thus a large number of people — legislative staff, judges, prosecutors, lawyers, administrators, legal scholars, and even police — want to inhabit a real legal system, not one that has the appearance of integrity but functions arbitrarily. They take legal reforms seriously and know that it is necessary not only to enact good rules, but also to implement them. In China, as many people have observed, faithful implementation is the name of the game, but it remains extremely difficult. Unfortunately, new judicial reforms may prove disappointing. […]

Judicial reform is one of the main challenges now confronting Chinese President Xi Jinping. Despite his emphasis on “rule of law,” Xi wants local courts reliably to submit to the discipline of the central party and judicial officials. He doesn’t want local judges to be independent of the central government, but he does aim to stop the local influences that distort local judgments. It’s too early to tell whether this effort and the parallel effort to improve the competence, status, and compensation of judges will succeed. But broad public dissatisfaction with the courts will probably continue, especially to the extent they continue to be instructed not to accept sensitive, controversial cases. [Source]

In trying to perform their professional roles Chinese lawyers are bound to meet serious obstacles. These can be related to corruption as much as to political control. For example, courts refuse to take on cases; criminal defense lawyers are denied access to clients in detention; witnesses for the defense are not heard in court; lawyers are interrupted and/or not listened to in court.

[…] When they confront party-state illegality[, rights] lawyers tend to make different choices from other professional colleagues. Generally, they insist on following legal rules, resist illegal pressure, and refuse to be – indeed given their vulnerable status, they cannot afford to be – corrupt. They expose the flaws of the system, try to put pressure on the officials handling a particular case and call for improvements. Doing so is hard and risky. […]

Today, rights lawyers have many more options for ‘taking the action from inside to outside the courtroom.’ They can, for example, tweet (use social media) to report in real time about an ongoing ‘sensitive’ trial; disseminate images of ‘flash’ demonstrations through the social media; and document state illegality using smartphones and other technology. As they number a few hundred now, rights lawyers also have different ways of networking all across the country, working not only with professional colleagues but also with certain client groups, such as petitioners and other human rights defenders. They still don’t win cases but their advocacy may be able to protect clients from further abuse; and it sends out a political message of resistance to arbitrariness and power abuses in the legal system.

[…] The hope of incremental liberalization through top-down legal reforms was extremely important in the post-Mao era but today, in my view, it is very nearly dead. Under Xi Jinping especially, the law has been changed to accommodate rather than curb power abuses. Law is not seen as imposing limits on the power of the government; rather, it is an expression of the power of the ruling Party, including ruthless power to control its own bureaucracy. This is not to deny, of course, that there are occasional welcome changes, for example, the decision to abolish the feared “re-education through labor” system in 2013. But such changes generally look better on paper than in reality and do not address the central challenge of power abuse. For example, the government continues to lock people up under numerous forms of detention without due – or simply without any – legal process. The Party’s vision for 2020 is therefore Party rule by law, at best – legal rules used when it serves power-holders, and disregarded when it does not. [Source]

2015 will go down in history as the year that Chinese authorities launched an unprecedented attack on China’s human rights lawyers. Since July, in coordinated nationwide operations, police summoned more than 300 lawyers and activists for interrogation and put many under secret detention, including some in “residential surveillance in a designated location,” a de facto type of enforced disappearance. For months, authorities deprived the detainees access to legal counsel and refused to inform families of their whereabouts. At the time of this report, 22 lawyers and activists remain in custody from this crackdown; 19 of these have been formally arrested, including 16 in January 2016. Of the 19 arrested, all but three face charges of “subversion” or “inciting subversion of state power.” These individuals are all being punished for seeking justice—boldly challenging the CCP-ruled government’s interference in the judiciary, standing up for clients’ rights, and refusing to yield to state pressure. In addition, throughout the year, rights lawyers continued to be subjected to violent beatings while carrying out their professional work in defending their clients. CHRD documented eight incidents of violence—against 13 defense lawyers— between January to June 2015.

[…] One especially disturbing development during the year was authorities’ use of the newly amended Criminal Law to stifle defense lawyers’ speech during court trials. Amendments to the CL that went into effect on November 1, 2015, codify the criminalization of lawyers’ speech during trials; specifically, it can be considered illegal for defense lawyers to speak up in court to challenge unlawful trial procedures or mistreatment of their clients (Article 309). The provision, which penalizes “disrupting courtroom order,” gives authorities broad powers to interpret lawyers’ speech in court as “insulting,” “threatening,” or “disruptive”—an offense punishable by up to three years in prison. Under the law, judges can also order lawyers expelled from the court. [Source]

The use of such a form reveals the cavalier manner in which the police violate their nation’s Criminal Procedure Law by arbitrarily denying the right to counsel in their attack on rights lawyers and other human rights advocates whom they have detained. Indeed, the police are doing exactly what Article 9 of the major September 2015 Five-Institution Regulation interpreting the 2012 Criminal Procedure Law explicitly forbids. They are failing to give lawyers requesting a meeting with their detained clients the reasons for rejecting the meeting.

[…] According to the law, lawyers should be able to vindicate their rights by seeking administrative review of the police refusal at the next higher police level and by asking the local procuracy to investigate the arbitrary police refusal. Such efforts are apparently being made but no one is holding his breath in the expectation that this will bring relief. For example, over 15 years later I am still waiting for the office of the Supreme People’s Procuracy in Beijing to send me its promised report reviewing the lawless detention of a Sino-American joint venture’s Chinese CFO by the city of Jining in Shandong Province. [Source]

“Firstly, they wouldn’t produce written confirmation that Wang Yu has terminated her instructions to me,” [Wang Yu’s lawyer Wen Donghai] said. “Neither would they let me visit Wang Yu to confirm it in person.”

“Given the circumstances, I’d say it is the police who are firing us.”

[…] “Basically, they are now hiring the lawyers; they won’t allow the families to do it,” he said. “This is ridiculous, and it is in breach of existing law on lawyers, and of the Criminal Procedure Law.”

Meanwhile, lawyer Huang Hanzhong, who represents Wang’s husband Bao Longjun, said he had received a similar notification after trying to visit his client at the Tianjin No. 2 Detention Center.

“Actually I had been expecting this, although I hoped it wouldn’t happen,” Huang said. “It shows what the attitude of the prosecuting authorities is; they are acting irrationally, unreasonable and illegally according to existing rules and legislation.” [Source]

In the course of my research on Chinese human rights lawyers over the past several years, I got to hear a lot about the techniques the government allegedly uses to control them. I came to refer to them as “fear techniques.” They included tracking and following; soft detention; “being traveled”; being asked in for “chats”; criminal, administrative, and judicial detention; violent attacks; forced disappearance; torture and—in one or two particularly disturbing instances—brief spells of medically unmotivated, forced psychiatric detention (被精神病). Some of these techniques made some reference to legal rules, but in their actual use of these rules against human rights lawyers, the authorities invariably, and quite often egregiously, broke the law.

Those forcibly “disappeared,” for example, were, in addition to being locked up, reportedly pressured to “confess” and “repent.” They usually also had to promise—in writing as well as in front of a camera recording their statements—that they would stop their work as human rights defenders: stop taking on certain kinds of cases, stop meeting each other, and so on. It did not matter that there were no crimes to confess to and that promises made under duress were not binding. As one lawyer commented in 2011, “Not only did they want to make you say that black was white, you also had to explain why black was white.” The point, he thought, was to show who was master and show that no law—not even that of elementary logic—constrained the power he had tried to resist. The authorities using these fear techniques were intent on stopping the lawyers’ efforts to represent their clients and to challenge power abuses, while dreaming of (if not actually building) a better system.

As the language of reform —according to a dictionary definition, “improvement or amendment of what is wrong, corrupt, unsatisfactory”—which was so long considered axiomatic for discussions of the Chinese legal system, is now being questioned more widely, I would suggest that rule by fear should be considered as a centrally important element of the “new normal” under Xi Jinping’s party leadership. [Source]

To be fair, the Chinese government has introduced discrete reforms that could decrease the prevalence of torture. The Committee against Torture flagged a number of these positive aspects in its Concluding Observations. Yet each of these reforms needs to be analyzed with a critical eye because, as Teng Biao, a Chinese human rights lawyer, astutely explained, “The major problem with rule of law in mainland China is not establishing legal provisions but rather implementing laws.” And here lies the key problem: the Chinese government places perpetuating one-party rule above a robust commitment to the rule of law and human rights.

[…] One of the most exciting recent developments in criminal procedure reforms has been the use of audio and video recordings of interrogations. […] The hope is that recording interrogations will both provide evidence of how individual cases are handled and encourage a change in police culture away from coercive practices.

Preliminary indications are, however, that recording interrogations is not significantly changing the culture of extreme reliance on confessions as the primary form of evidence in criminal cases. […]

[…] The value of recordings is further limited if the court does not view the interrogation process with a skeptical eye, if the defense has a difficult time accessing the recordings, or if there simply is no defense lawyer, which is true for most criminal cases. Suspects need lawyers in order to understand their rights and then have someone advocate for those rights. No recording, even if completely accurate, can ever replace these fundamental functions. The Chinese government is increasingly intolerant of defense lawyers who zealously advocate for clients’ rights leading to reprisals against the lawyers rather than praise for their contributions to the rule of law. The Committee against Torture expressed deep concern for the recent crackdown on defense lawyers stating, “This reported crackdown on human rights lawyers follows a series of other reported escalating abuses on lawyers for carrying out their professional responsibilities, particularly on cases involving government accountability and issues such as torture, defence of human rights activists and religious practitioners.” [Source]

“We are seeing a very worrying pattern in China that has serious implications for civil society and the important work they do across the country,” the High Commissioner said. “Civil society actors, from lawyers and journalists to NGO workers, have the right to carry out their work, and it is the States’ duty to support and protect them,” he said.

The High Commissioner said he appreciated the opportunity to raise such cases with Chinese officials in Geneva, and acknowledged their efforts to clarify the matters at issue. However, the responses he received indicate that the authorities “too often reflexively confuse the legitimate role of lawyers and activists with threats to public order and security.”

[…] “Lawyers should never have to suffer prosecution or any other kind of sanctions or intimidation for discharging their professional duties” Zeid said, adding that lawyers have an essential role to play in protecting human rights and the rule of law.

“I urge the Government of China to release all of them immediately and without conditions.” [Source]

On 16 February 2016, in response to the press release by UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Mr. Zeid Ra’ad HUSSEIN on several individual cases of China, the Spokesperson of the Permanent Mission of China made the following clarifications, stressing that all those cases raised involve illegal and criminal activities, and has nothing to do with restrictions of the rights and freedoms. The Chinese Mission expresses strong dissatisfaction and disagreement with the High Commissioner’s misleading remarks.

[…] China is ruled by law and everyone is equal before the law, no matter what his/her occupation is. All Chinese laws, including the National Security Law, give emphasis to promoting and protecting human rights. Meanwhile, undermining social stability and order in the name of exercising human rights and freedom of expression will not be allowed in any country ruled by law. The High Commissioner made irresponsible comments in disregard of facts, which is sending to the outside world a wrong signal. We hope that Mr. Hussein as UN human rights chief could view China’s human rights in a comprehensive, objective and rational manner, rather than a biased, subjective and selective way. [Source]

The ABA’s professional staff in Washington opposed any public condemnation. They feared that, in the current repressive atmosphere in Beijing, the association’s China office might be shut down and some of their Chinese staff detained.

[…] Some American lawyers even favor taking the initiative now to close the ABA’s China office until the human-rights pendulum begins to swing in a positive direction again. They believe that little significant law-reform progress can be made in China in the present climate and the office is a hostage that impedes an appropriate response to repression.

But if the ABA leaves China, what will become of the Chinese staff and their American colleagues in terms of employment and personal safety? Pulling out isn’t likely to dissuade the Xi regime from its repression.

In principle, tens of thousands of China’s judges, prosecutors, lawyers, administrators, law professors and students who helplessly oppose the current repression would welcome a stronger foreign protest. But ABA withdrawal might also create a sense of abandonment by those who have encouraged Beijing’s efforts to develop a genuine rule of law. One has to weigh the world-wide effects of its strong condemnation of Beijing’s repression against the loss of the valuable training contribution resulting from the ABA’s forcible or voluntary withdrawal from China.

[…] President Xi is playing a rough game, and cooperation between foreigners and Chinese in the legal field may become extremely difficult during the rest of his tenure. Powerful opposition both within and outside China offers the only hope of improving a dire situation. This is a messy, unhappy time for the rule of law in China, and there are no good solutions. [Source]

China venerates the idea of benevolent justice, as widespread admiration for the legendary Song dynasty Judge Bao shows, but it lacks an independent and impartial system of justice. Powerful Communist Party committees typically instruct judges how to rule in sensitive cases. Only 0.07 percent of court cases in 2013 ended in acquittal.

Those factors may help explain the large online reaction among legal professionals in China to Justice Scalia’s death over the weekend. By Monday morning, several essays were circulating in Chinese. One, a lengthy, 12,000-character paean written by He Fan, a justice on China’s Supreme People’s Court, and posted to his Weixin account, funnylaw1978, had been read more than 66,000 times and drew many comments. [funnylaw1978 is among the accounts highlighted by Susan Finder at Supreme People’s Court Monitor last month in an overview of legal resources on the platform.]

Justice He, an expert on the United States Supreme Court who has written and translated several books about the American justice system, called Justice Scalia “maverick and brilliant” and a “judicial genius.”

[…] China is undertaking major changes to its legal system aimed at improving the quality of justice. Few expect the outcome to be a truly independent judiciary, however. [Source]

“All rules are made by men, and at any given time political influences can take over,” the nationalist tabloid Global Times said in an editorial on Wednesday (in Chinese). “The fight over Scalia’s replacement shows that even the U.S., this model of ‘judicial independence,’ is no exception.”

The Communist Party flagship newspaper People’s Daily, which publishes the Global Times, likewise took a swipe at the U.S.’s independent judiciary in an analysis of the fallout from Mr. Scalia’s death. “In practice it’s utterly impossible for this so-called judicial independence to break free of the influence of party politics,” it said (in Chinese).

[…] Under President Xi Jinping, Communist Party officials have been tasked with reforming China’s traditionally weak legal system. Their goal, outlined in a raft of legal reform documents, is to create courts that are independent enough to be accepted as legitimate but not so independent they can challenge the Communist Party’s ultimate authority.

In selling “socialist rule of law with Chinese characteristics,” as the system is known in party writings, official media have portrayed the rule of law practiced in Western countries as unsuitable for China. In their Wednesday pieces, both People’s Daily and Global Times took the sales pitch further, depicting the U.S.’s highest court as a political battlefield incapable of delivering independent judgments. [Source]

In a prison courtroom, Hainan’s top judge, Fu Qin, bowed to Chen in apology on behalf of the court, which issued the death sentence 21 years ago, said Chen’s lawyer, Wang Wanqiong.

[…] The fairness of Chen’s trial was questioned at the time, with his lawyer identifying 18 contradictions in his testimony, Thepaper.cn reported yesterday.

Wang said Chen was tortured into confessing. “He was strangled until he almost suffocated and his joints were beaten with sticks and steel rods,” she said.

[…] The authorities have yet to announce an investigation into the judges, prosecutors and police officers involved in the original verdict. “Chen said those people should be held responsible, but he had no hatred towards them and believed it should be left to the law to decide,” Wang said. [Source]

Accountability for acts carried out in individual cases is perhaps the easy part; much more difficult is to assess responsibility for the deeper institutional causes underlying wrongful convictions—such as the role that inter-institutional “coordination” plays in weakening the procedural checks that are supposed to protect suspects and defendants from miscarriages of justice. The worst outcome would be for accountability in the Huugjilt case to be merely a propaganda effort aimed at convincing the public of authorities’ sincerity at tackling the problem of wrongful convictions. Punishing Feng Zhiming for wrongdoing is only the first step. What’s even more essential is to bring an end to the ways that campaign-style “strike hard” policing and stability-first policies have shaped practices within the Chinese criminal justice system for decades. [Source]

The main reason for the spate of confessional television in China is, in fact, political: it is a conscious policy of the regime of Xi Jinping, China’s ruler for the past three years. In an illuminating essay last March, David Bandurski of the China Media Project at the University of Hong Kong pointed out that what he called “China’s confessional politics of dominance” has its roots in the Communist Party’s own history, and in the Soviet influences that helped shape it before it took power. Confession and self-criticism have been part of its ruling strategy since its revolutionary leaders lived in caves in Yan’an and plotted against their neighbouring cavemen. Virtually everybody in China—even Deng Xiaoping and, almost certainly during Mao’s rule, Mr Xi himself—has written at least one piece of self-criticism. At the other end of the scale, even Banyan has done it, when he was a student and later reporter in China, with a few eloquent self-flagellations—now (he hopes) gathering dust in some forgotten archive.

In writing self-criticism, the secret is to ponder not truth, justice or cultural norms, but what your reader wants. As Mr Bandurski put it: “As in the past, today’s culture of confession is not about accountability, clean government or a rules-based system. It is about dominance and submission.” Mr Xi’s revival of this culture is not accidental. It is a reminder that his party’s tolerance for dissent is lower now than at any time since the early 1990s. One symptom of this is its insistence that China’s people—and foreigners working in the country—must accept that, even if they cannot love him, Big Brother is right. [Source]

“One of the blacklisted officials responsible for the wrongful conviction of Huugjiltu, Feng Zhiming, was suspected of job-related crimes and was subject to further investigation,” Xinhua reported authorities as saying in a statement.

Feng, a former deputy chief with the public security bureau in Hohhot, could face prosecution, Xinhua added.

The other 26 – among them police officers and court officials – “received administrative penalties including admonitions and record of demerit”, Xinhua said without giving further detail.

The case has highlighted the shortcomings in China’s Communist Party-controlled legal system, where acquittals are extremely rare – 99.93 per cent of defendants in criminal cases were found guilty in 2013, according to official statistics. [Source]

“Unfairly receiving accusations with no chance of defending themselves – this is not new, but it’s an adaptation to new technology that now makes it possible for everybody to see this,” said Jerome Cohen, a law professor at New York University and one of the foremost Western scholars on China’s legal system.

[…] “It’s a sad thing to see people put before the television and other media, before they have been even formally arrested,” he said. “It’s a pathetic thing and will defeat any chance the Chinese government has of trying to have a good reputation.”

[…] In a country where the ruling Communist Party controls the entire judicial process and the conviction rate in criminal cases is nearly 100%, the TV confessions come at a time when the leadership under Xi is fighting to rein in public opinion in the Internet age and tightening its grip over political dissent.

Pointing to the Dahlin detention and “confession” as an example, observers say it sets the stage for China to pass a controversial law governing the fast-growing number of foreign non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in the country on grounds of national security.

[…] “CCTV’s broadcasts are tantamount to trial by media and they convict people without the court,” said Mo Shaoping, a prominent Beijing lawyer known for defending sensitive human rights cases. “They never air people’s denial of their alleged crimes, or quote us lawyers. It’s against basic journalistic principles.” [Source]

Eva Pils of King’s College in London has extensively researched Chinese law and the status of the country’s human rights lawyers. She says the media campaign was an integral part of the crackdown. “The intended impact is clearly intimidation,” Pils says. “I would call that visual repression—using images of persecuted lawyers to signal to the rest of society: ‘Make sure this is not you. You don’t want to end up in this place.’ Consider the effect these reports and broadcasts have on other members of the legal profession. You might be scared; you might think about exactly how much you would be prepared to use social media to discuss your case or reach out to colleagues,” she says.

[…] One media smear campaign out of a historical playbook suggests that the government narrative is not selling well. [Sharon] Hom of Human Rights in China says, “Even though the online space is being controlled, regulated, monitored, what was interesting was that in the aftermath of that smear campaign, we saw posts … where it was not only family members who spoke out,” she says. In spite of the “ecosystem of intimidation,” a range of messages surfaced questioning the state’s account.

[…] There is precedent for the Chinese government’s current campaign against human rights lawyers. In 2011, dozens of lawyers, activists and human rights workers were targeted. Many, such as prominent rights lawyer Teng Biao, were kidnapped, held incommunicado and tortured. (See “The Most Dangerous Job in Law,” ABA Journal, February 2015.) Then, as now, the government aimed to send a strong message to those considering “subversive” acts.

But the 2011 action also showed how “repression produces effects that are unintended from the perspective of those in charge,” Pils says. “There was a broad expectation that it would have a very, very bad chilling effect,” she says. “What happened was the movement grew. More and more lawyers were joining these groups, were holding meetings … and taking on cases together with more experienced human rights lawyers—even just joining signature campaigns or a social media group discussing a human rights issue was a meaningful first step that could lead to further involvement down the line. This is how the number of human rights lawyers grew from a few dozen or so five years ago to some 200-300 today. It’s too early to say what will happen from the effect of current repression.” [Source]

Mr. Pu is the most prominent rights lawyer to be arrested in a wave of detentions and imprisonments of legal practitioners, though President Xi Jinping and other Chinese leaders have repeatedly pledged to strengthen the rule of law. Lawyers say the arrests are the greatest assault on their profession in decades. Mr. Pu’s case has taken on symbolic significance, as an indication of Mr. Xi and the Communist Party’s growing intolerance for liberal political thought and their abiding need to control any channels for discussion of social ills.

“Under Xi Jinping, our society has been regressing,” said Hu Jia, a rights activist who was imprisoned from December 2007 to June 2011 for his writings. “The authorities are doing this because they want people to feel that their fingers are loaded with a lot of weight when typing on the keyboard.”

[…] Late Monday morning, Sophie Richardson, the China director of Human Rights Watch, said in an email that the trial of Mr. Pu, along with the physical harassment of observers outside the courthouse, “suggests we have gone from a deteriorating environment to an all-out free fall.”

“The law in China today is nothing more than an instrument of the leadership’s political impulses — a reality with frightening consequences inside and outside the country,” she added. [Source]

“The significance of the case is this: Where is the boundary between using harsh and rude words to criticize public figures and events, and freedom of speech? Our viewpoints are:

“First, apart from speech that leads to immediate danger, speech should not be deemed a criminal act. For instance, if you spread the lie that a theater is on fire and that triggers a stampede where people are injured or die, this would be speech that causes an immediate danger. Anything else should just be tolerated as free speech.

“Second, the public has the constitutional right to criticize public figures. It’s enshrined in the Chinese Constitution. Public figures should be more tolerant and should not charge someone just because his or her language is rude.

“Third, Weibo is a special platform of expression, and it’s an instant channel where people comment on events and public figures. Therefore, control over Weibo should be more tolerant than control over conventional media. It’s different from conventional media because it involves the expression of emotions. There should be a greater degree of free speech there compared with conventional media.” [Source]

He writes that the four posts cited in the “inciting ethnic hatred” charge—two pairs posted more than two years apart—do not demonstrate the coherent and continuous intent required by law. The two earlier ones, he concludes, should be inadmissible as evidence.

Although Pu’s choice of words on religious restrictions in Tibet and Xinjiang was “too sharp,” He believes that his judgment was correct. In criticizing local actions which contravened central policy and harmed China’s image abroad, Pu committed no crime under Chinese law, and in fact performed a service to the Party and state. His comment on a reported veil ban may have been factually dubious, but the right enshrined in the Chinese Constitution is to criticize the government, not to criticize the government correctly; to speak freely, not accurately. Even if wrong, Pu’s remarks fall within the bounds of free expression.

He Bing points out that “inciting ethnic hatred” means to incite hatred between ethnic groups, not to incite hatred of government and Party, which would fall under the crime of inciting subversion. The government and Party officially represent all ethnic groups, not just the Han: to equate dissatisfaction with them among ethnic minorities with ethnic hatred is therefore both a legal and political error. He concludes that Pu’s posts lack both the subjective intent and objective effect of inciting ethnic hatred, and do not constitute a crime.

In three further posts published between July 2011 and July 2013, Pu was accused of “picking quarrels” by using “abusive language to brazenly insult numerous people […], attracting a large number of online users to view, repost, and comment on his posts and creating an odious social impact.” Days before the last post appeared, the Supreme People’s Court and Supreme People’s Procuratorate (the “Two Supremes”) issued an interpretation on handling cases involving “picking quarrels.” A further interpretation on applying the law to cases of online libel was issued that September. It is an open question, according to He, whether the former interpretation should be retroactively applied to the two posts that predate it. Even if so, the earlier one should not be bundled with the others, as it exceeds the Two Supremes’ one-year limit on linking offenses. If the court endorses the logic that any old Weibo posts since 2013 can be artificially linked to play up the severity of a case with no time limits, He writes, then “picking quarrels” will become equivalent to the Cultural Revolution crime of being a “bad element.”

He agrees that Pu used “excessive” language in calling the spokeswoman for a manufacturer of railway signals blamed for the Wenzhou high speed rail crash “a sow.” But he did not mention her by name, and based on the content of the post alone, there is no way to identify her. (He himself initially struggled to do so.) Given the post’s limited reach, it had no serious consequences. Explicitly calling Mao’s grandson Mao Xinyu “a fool,” on the other hand, is not a serious insult given the term’s widespread use online. The two instances of this post were reposted a total of 249 times, far short of the 500-repost standard established in 2013, so their effect was also not too grave. Personally speaking, though, He feels that Pu should make a formal apology to Shen Jilan for suggesting that after 60 years of “playing the fool” as an unwaveringly obedient NPC member, she should “die on the battlefield.”

Finally, He writes that based on Supreme People’s Court judgments, state media content, and Xi Jinping’s own words, sharp criticism of the Party and leaders may be deemed an “error,” but is not a crime.

The Communist Party of China draws no clear lines about what speech it will tolerate. Who gets punished, and how badly, depends not only on what one says but on many other factors: who one is; whom one is connected to; what people one has offended; who those people are connected to; how widespread the damage is seen to be, both to those people and to the prestige of the Communist Party; and more.

Once the authorities have determined that someone has “crossed a line,” a language game ensues over what written rule, if any, was violated. For years, Pu Zhiqiang was able to win these language games for other people because of his intimate grasp of the law. He could out-manoeuvre government prosecutors, and they, knowing this, were reluctant to take him on.

[…] During the months of the investigation, it was clear from the reports of his friends and his colleagues whom the police were interviewing that the regime was trying to pin something really big on him, like treason or major financial corruption. Second best would be something really embarrassing, like sexual misconduct.

But apparently all these efforts yielded nothing and prosecutors had to settle for “stirring up trouble” and “inciting ethnic hatred” based on seven posts Pu had putting on […] the Chinese counterpart of Twitter. [Source]

If Old Pu is guilty, it is also because he has made a political mistake. It’s just as Global Times Chief Editor Hu [Xijin] said: “Objectively, Pu Zhiqiang’s case is very hard to judge, since Pu himself is a lawyer, yet he has long been committed to politics. In Chinese society and in the arena of public opinion, he is one of the symbols of the anti-establishment. His words and deeds clearly constitute a certain destructive force for social governance. This destructive force has emerged from the new social reality resulting from China entering the age of the Internet, and is a new form of challenge to legal authority.”

Editor Hu says the case is hard to judge because Pu is committed to politics, and is a symbol of anti-establishmentarians. This is a political determination. Because, while Editor Hu doesn’t understand the law, he does understand history. What two crimes determined from seven Weibo posts means for the history books, he also knows. When Old Pu was taken away, it wasn’t because he posted on Weibo, but because he attended a meeting. Now, when seven Weibo posts are incriminating him, these posts have already been deleted. Not even a skeleton of his account survives. If he had been caught committing a crime, with the rigor of Weibo inspection at the time, then he would have been caught long ago. This is simple, you could say, nothing other than finding a crime to fit the person. Why find a crime? Because Old Pu is committed to politics, and just like he himself jokes, he’s already become a “big shot outside the system.” [Chinese]

According to the “100-1=0 principle”, as advocated by President Xi Jinping (習近平), the negative influence of one miscarriage of justice is sufficient to destroy the accumulated goodwill of 99 justly decided cases. Attention turned on Monday to a single case in a Beijing courtroom: lawyer Pu Zhiqiang’s trial for “inciting ethnic hatred” and “picking quarrels and provoking trouble” through comments on his microblog. Chinese authorities have detained the renowned civil rights lawyer since May last year.

[…] Selective prosecution of lawyers who peacefully use the legal system to defend citizens’ rights undermines the substantial progress that China has made to many aspects of its criminal justice system. In recent years, China has decreased its use of the death penalty, introduced procedures aimed at increasing the number of people released on bail, and expanded videotaping of interrogations in an effort to decrease coerced confessions.

[…] Despite the party’s call in a major policy document last year to “make the people feel fairness and justice in every judicial case”, even a miracle acquittal would not erase the injustice of Pu’s 18-month detention. At best, Pu can hope for prompt release based on his time already served in detention or some form of medical release in light of his health conditions. Whatever the eventual verdict, its significance will reverberate as an indication of the health of China’s criminal justice system. [Source]

In 2015, President Xi globe-trotted to more than a dozen countries, promoting the friendly face of the world’s second largest economy. Around the world, the Chinese government has unveiled Confucius Institutes to subsidize study of Chinese language and culture; at the same time, more than 300,000 Chinese students are now enrolled in American schools. At New York City’s Times Square, a giant screen has broadcast a slick video illustrating Xi’s leadership mantra, the “China Dream.” State media, like broadcaster CCTV, have expanded overseas, even as Western media organizations have diminished their global coverage. When President Xi visited Britain in October, he rode in a golden carriage to Buckingham Palace and pledged $46 billion in trade and investment. Xi’s tour of Africa earlier this month brought vows of $60 billion in dollar diplomacy.

But soft power loses its gauzy delicacy when human-rights lawyers are jailed and their supporters harassed. The world has one Nobel Peace Prize laureate in jail, and he languishes in a Chinese prison. For all the positive developments in China — and there are so many, from poverty alleviation and upward mobility, not to mention digital innovation and expanding consumer choice — official repression of free thinkers only serves to outline the steely fist of authoritarianism. [Source]

On Monday morning, two recent graduates from the China University of Political Science and Law, Pu’s alma mater, quietly snapped pictures of the courthouse with their phones. Both wore masks to protect themselves against the thick air pollution that has intermittently smothered the city in recent months.

“We’re disappointed, because it still feels so dangerous to follow in [Pu’s] footsteps, to become a rights lawyer,” said one, a young man in a black jacket who requested anonymity for fear of official reprisals.

“We can brag and say that we’ll continue his mission,” he continued. “But the political environment is like the weather. So we can only take things step by step.” [Source]

In another era, Pu Zhiqiang might have live-tweeted the Tiananmen massacre. Instead, as the bloodbath unfolded around him on that pre-smartphone night in the early summer of 1989, the student leader took a solemn vow: if he made it out with his life he would use it to give voice to those who had died.

[…] Pu, now 50, went on to become China’s most admired and rambunctious advocate of free speech; an internet-savvy civil rights lawyer and Communist party critic whose withering and often witty online critiques of the party earned him tens of thousands of online followers but also made him an avowed enemy of the Chinese state.

[… American academic Perry] Link, whose criticism of Beijing has seen him banned from entering China, said Chinese authorities had tried – but failed – to uncover more serious offences to justify Pu’s politically motivated jailing. “They were trying to find that he was sexually promiscuous, or that he had avoided taxes or was corrupt [or] a traitor,” he said. “But I think what we learn now when we see that there is only seven tweets as the evidence, is that they essentially came up empty on all of that.”

Link said he suspected there was considerable embarrassment, even within the Communist party itself, “at the prospect of putting a man away for tweeting”. [Source]

2013-01-31 Comments: 242 Retweets: 249
Besides luck and bloodline, the reason Shen Jilan could become a delegate and Mao Xinyu could become a committee member is because they are either playing fools or being real fools. This means the NPC and CPPCC are nothing. If one wants to live like a duck in the water, either you play the fool or become a real fool. I don’t expect Mao to be smart. I hope Shen [could realize] being alive is lighter than a feather, death is weightier than Mount Tai. How good it would be if you die! You are already 84 and have been a NPC delegate for 60 years. Now it finally comes to a crucial point. Why not die on the battlefield and blackmail the NPC to win the title of an upright and principled woman?

2014-3-2 Comments: 1071 Retweets: 1930
What happened in Kunming was too bloody. The murders are very sinful. I believe this time that it is Xinjiang separatist forces that made the terror attack. But it is the result, not the cause. Such a severe result, with so many people dead and injured, you just explained to me with one sentence: That it is because of Xinjiang separatist forces, but not your responsibility. I am not satisfied with that. You have been boasting of the Party’s policies, saying Uygur ethnic groups support the Party, how come the bloody thing happened? President of the Law Society Wang Lequan, you reigned over the west region for over a decade, and you are familiar with the region. You tell me, why is this happening? Who is the target?” [Source]

Pu himself insists that his comments do not constitute criminal acts. Shang Baojun, one of his lawyers, said this week that “he admitted that his remarks were emotionally charged, sarcastic and even rude sometimes, he is willing to apologise. But he doesn’t think he has broken the law.”

The treatment of these two men demonstrates the continuing use of authoritarian and arbitrary punishment of alleged sources of social unrest.

The use of the courts to punish activists is part of the broader campaign by the party-state to tighten control over society. Its focus on the media is clear: China was ranked 176th out of 180 countries in Reporters Without Borders’ 2015 index of worldwide press freedom.

[…] The anxiety over control may provide the answer to a question: Why has handling the activists’ cases taken so long? One possible reason is that the party became preoccupied with the threatened collapse of the stock market and other financial problems, and the leadership did not want to risk raising social discontent in a society already beset with anxiety and doubts about prevailing policies.

Whatever the cause, the handling of these cases demonstrates China’s use of the courts for purely political purposes. [Source]

If China had a truly independent, impartial and professional judicial system, Pu would never have been in detention in the first place; the publicly available evidence shows nothing that would substantiate the charges against him. Such a judicial system would not have allowed such prolonged detention before the suspect saw a judge, was able to challenge the basis for his detention, and had regular access to family and lawyers.

Pu languishes in detention precisely because China’s legal system is so nakedly politicized. Because Beijing cannot decide what do with Pu, whose case has attracted considerable international attention, it will use the “legal” system to continue silencing him. [Source]

Many diplomats in Beijing representing the 36 countries with a stated interest in improving human rights are rightly pessimistic about the outcome of Pu’s, and other similar cases. Those diplomats who have fought hard – with the Chinese government and/or within their own governments for stronger support for human rights – wonder what can make a difference in this case. It is a reasonable question, particularly in light of the all-out assault against human rights and the rule of law by President Xi Jinping and his allies.

[… A]t a trial that will be closely watched across the country and the globe, what better way to demonstrate high-level concern and solidarity than by appearing together? Not only would this significantly raise the price for Beijing as it calculates just how long to lock Pu away, it would also send a powerful message of support to those facing similar reprisals as Pu – people who work on issues these governments say they support, like independent media, environmental protection, anti-corruption, women’s rights, and legal reform. [Source]

Ge Limei, from Shoushan village, Harbin, in Heilongjiang province became a petitioner after her husband Li Jidong died in 2010 while serving a jail sentence for an unspecified crime.

The official autopsy said Li died of malnutrition, but Ge insisted that she saw bruises on her husband’s body, The Beijing News reported.

[…] Shu Xiangxin, Ge’s lawyer doubted the verdict, saying chat history of messages on her phone suggested that Ge had repeatedly stated that she had sought a legal solution to the case instead of money.

Hong Daode, a law professor with China University of Political Science and Law, said that under mainland law, victims of blackmail had to be a person, and the government was not a person. [Source]

Legal experts say political prisoners in China are often pushed to own up their supposed guilt in the absence of evidence to incriminate them, even though confessions alone are not allowed as evidence against defendants under Chinese law.

[…] Liang Xiaojun, a director of the Beijing Daoheng Law Firm, said extracted confessions were often a “face-saving” way out for authorities – an attempt to prove that they are right in detaining someone even when they find little evidence of an offence and also to smear the government critics they want to rein in.

[…] The authorities often first arrest people they see as troublemakers, raid their homes to look for incriminating evidence and pressure them to admit a crime, then use catch-all charges such as public order or state security charges to indict them, he said.

Eva Pils, a China law expert at King’s College, London, said TV confessions by “suspects” at the early stages of detention were against the spirit of the rule of law and intended to establish a presumption of guilt in the mind of the public. She said the fact that Gao withdrew her “admission” at her initial trial and “confessed” again when she was seriously ill “weakened the credibility of her confession”. [Source]

That Gao was released at all, though, may be a sign that despite Global Times’ claims, foreign pressure can help in such cases. Christoph Straesser, the German government’s Commissioner for Human Rights and Humanitarian Aid, made this case in an interview with Deutsche Welle’s Dang Yuan:

Germany and other Western governments have repeatedly called for Gao’s release, and DW reported extensively about the case. Do you think the international attention drawn by governments and independent media contributed to Gao being allowed to spend her sentence outside of prison?

Based on the results – yes – but it’s difficult to concretely determine which circumstances led to her medical bail. We have repeatedly pointed out that it is important for humanitarian reasons that Gao receives adequate medical care given that she had another heart attack in October. I believe that this insistence – not only by the public, but also through diplomatic channels – ultimately helped her.

When you point to specific human rights violations to your partners in China, are you meddling in China’s internal affairs?

No. In my opinion, this is an incorrect perception of reality. Whenever we address individual cases, we broach the topic solely on the basis of international rule of law agreements and compliance with these standards. So it’s no interference in the internal affairs of another country when there is reason to believe, for example, that the rights to freedom of speech and freedom of the press are being violated.

We have to meet our international obligations, which the People’s Republic of China has also largely ratified. [Source]

The plight of China’s lawyers, journalists and other professionals hasn’t dissuaded Ren. His determination to become a lawyer was strengthened by the fate of one of China’s top human-rights lawyers, Pu Zhiqiang, who was once named lawyer of the year by a respected Chinese magazine. Pu had acted as Ren’s lawyer, and his intervention likely catalyzed Ren’s release from the labor camp. After his client was freed, Pu served as Ren’s witness at his wedding.

[…] In response to his lawyer’s detention, Ren stepped up his legal studies. “[I thought] if I could become I lawyer in the future, I could also defend people in court,” he says. “Whether my efforts are successful or not, at least I can solve problems within the scope of rule of law.”

But with little sign that this crackdown on dissent will ease, what can Ren and others accomplish? Even this newly minted lawyer is realistic. “Social progress depends on the rule of law,” Ren says. “I am kind of pessimistic about rule of law in China.” [Source]